Apple's iPad brought about the tablet revolution when it was introduced in early 2010, and the Cupertino, California-based company has made great efforts to push the tablets onto regular consumers, businesses, and even into classrooms.

Lasts week, it was announced that Apple secured a $30M contract (an average of $678 per iPad) to provide iPads to the L.A. Unified School District. This week, we've learned that American Airlines (having completed its trial run) has become to the first major commercial airline to put iPads in the cockpits of its entire fleet of aircraft (currently consisting of the Boeing 777, 767, 757, 737 and MD-80).

For American Airlines, the move to digital documents viewable on the iPad was easy. Each 1.35-pound iPad replaces over 35 pounds of paper documents and reference manuals that pilots carry in their kitbag. The iPads also allow for quick and efficient updating of manuals in minutes without wasting paper.

"In fact, removing the kitbag from all of our planes saves a minimum of 400,000 gallons and $1.2 million of fuel annually based on current fuel prices," remarked said David Campbell, American Airlines' Vice President of Safety and Operations Performance. "Additionally, each of the more than 8,000 iPads we have deployed to date replaces more than 3,000 pages of paper previously carried by every active pilot and instructor. Altogether, 24 million pages of paper documents have been eliminated."

[Image Source: AINonline]

Interestingly enough, while American Airlines pilots have free reign over the use of their iPads in the cockpits, passengers still have to turn off and stow their devices during ascent and descent. However, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is looking to relax those rules a bit for e-readers, tablets, and other smart devices.

It's very wise to consider letting passengers use their devices during flight . After all in present day world , so much of work is done and can be done without sitting on office desk , through inter net . And every one's job is becoming more and more demanding thus creating a serious time crunch . On top of it a person has to sit doing nothing during flight is a criminal waste of time , from today's standard. So , creating a regular system for communication for the passengers is certainly needed . In the interest of growth of mankind !

I get the sarcasm (assuming it was intended). I am sick of the always-on mentality these days. Life was seriously simpler just 10 or 15 years ago. Nowadays connectivity is like an addiction; you feel naked and helpless without it.

My city experienced just experienced major flooding and power was cut for around 36 hours. You don't realize the dependence you have on technology until it is taken away, even for so ridiculously brief a time.